


Swallow My Doubt

by TGBMcCray



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: A fun fic to help me get through the angst of One Summer, AH - Freeform, AU, Blackhawks, Chicago, College-Ben, F/M, Fix It, Floof, HockeyBen, I don't know why I started another story, I hated Econ, University studying (and heavy petting to start)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-02-07
Updated: 2020-11-21
Packaged: 2021-02-28 00:21:34
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 8,383
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22594711
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TGBMcCray/pseuds/TGBMcCray
Summary: Rey Niima has wanted Ben Solo since she first watched him slam an opponent in the jaw with a meaty fist while laced into hockey boots so large that what people say about him has to be true. Unfortunately, making out with her college's best hockey player would require actually speaking to him first.
Relationships: Rey & Ben Solo | Kylo Ren, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 99
Kudos: 159





	1. Blackhawk Down

I can’t stay in my apartment. I’ll start watching reruns of Chopped or The Office or God, forbid, listening to Brian Bedford talk to Little John on damned Disney + and it will be all over for me and this Econ midterm. I’m going to the library, but I’m not wearing clothes. That’s too much.

Generally speaking, I hate clothes. I’m little and nobody would notice my tits if I pressed them up against the glass during a Blackhawks game anyway, so I forgo a bra and just shrug into an oversized Blackhawks jersey and my favorite Christmas jammie pants. They say, “Get lit!” all over them in cursive writing with little strings of printed Christmas lights on a bright green background. Yeah, it’s March. Ask me if I care.

The library will be empty anyway. At least I’m telling myself that as I weave my messy hair into two quick braids and grab my lanyard and computer bag.

Jesus H., it’s cold out tonight. That damned groundhog was a lying liar who lies. Thinking better of leaving my coat, I run up the steps that are still crunchy with old salt and dirty snow, let myself back in, and grab my favorite Outlander-inspired plaid throw/wrap thingie. What’s the worst that could happen?

***

Paige Tico hands me a coffee in a little Styrofoam cup after I swipe in. “You look like my brother’s closet exploded,” she snipes, motioning toward the Splenda and powdered creamer.

I look down, puzzled. “Your brother has Christmas jammies?”

“Yes. Doesn’t everybody? Mom makes us do family pictures still. This year’s theme was ‘Beary Christmas!’ Rose wore an actual polar bear costume.”

I blow on the coffee, rolling my eyes. “You guys are fucking weird. How long do you have to stay here, anyway?”

She pushes up the sleeve of her oversized gray knitted sweater with two white manicured fingers and glances at her Apple watch. “Another hour. If you actually study that long, we can walk home together.”

Saying goodbye to Paige, I make my way through an empty but warm room full of computers, past the door to the grad assistant rooms, and toward the couches in the back. There’s a purple armchair in here with my name on it. It’s threadbare and smells of questionable substances but the back is too straight to encourage sleeping or random trips down the Tumblr rabbit hole on my phone.

Except of course, that I’m wrong. Apparently, said purple chair can be lounged upon. At this exact moment in time, a too familiar and yet, sadly out-of-my-reach six-foot-three specimen of the male anatomy is filling it. His long legs, in black jeans and dark laced boots, take up the ottoman he’s pulled in front of it and the mass of his wide shoulders lean to the left slightly. His plush lips are wrapped around the end of a mechanical pencil. I blink. That lovely dark hair, which I am convinced he wears long to cover up ears that are misshapen or too big for his head, or somehow not fitting with the perfection of the rest of him, is falling over his forehead and against the lashes of his space-dark eyes. As I watch, he sighs, uncrosses and recrosses his lethally long legs on the ottoman, and runs one big hand through his hair, lifting it out of his line of sight. He’s staring at the same Economics book I have in my bag.

Ben fucking Solo.

For about 2.5 seconds, I consider walking over and plunking down on the mismatched 70s orange loveseat catty corner to him, but it’s a brash flash of madness only. Swallowing a big slurp of coffee, I take off in a perpendicular line for a lived-in couch across the room, yanking my plaid higher around my shoulders.

A girl might dream, but only when there’s melatonin and vodka involved. This is real life, after all.


	2. Coffee or Tea or Me

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's our good boy's birthday! Happy birthday, Ben Swolllllllo. We all love you!

He must be in another section. For God’s sake, if he was in my section, I would’ve noticed him. I mean, there are like 300 people in there at a time, but still. He stands out in a crowd, being a head taller than most, and you know, criminally attractive.

Except to Paige, but Paige has sod for brains. She finds my obsession with Solo perplexing, having often said that his face looks like he got hit one too many times with someone’s stick during game. Apparently, the left side of his face is slightly wider than the right. I ask you, with a body like that, who in their right fucking mind cares about symmetry?

Also, I kind of like that his face doesn’t quite hold up to Grecian standards. There’s something interesting, almost to the point of obsession-worthy in the oddity, the deep dimples that become grooves on each side of his sinful mouth, accentuating plush lips that look made for kissing every part of my anatomy…

Economics. Damn it, I’m going to fail. Pulling out my notes and the study guide Professor Hux gave us last week, I try to concentrate on something besides the Prince of Dark Ice behind me.

_If supply and demand both shift to the right at the same time, what can we say about equilibrium price and quantity?_

  1. _Both will increase_
  2. _Price will increase, quantity may increase or decrease_
  3. _Both will decrease_
  4. _Quantity will increase, price may increase or decrease_
  5. _Price will decrease, and quantity will increase_



**

Forty minutes later I think I sort of understand supply and demand, but marginal cost and price elasticity feel like they should be similar but they aren’t. Also, I’m out of coffee. I’m staring at my empty cup on the metal coffee table in front of me when someone puts a fresh cup down next to it.

“Do you take sugar or creamer?”

Ben Solo sits down on the shabby loveseat beside me, pulling little International Delights out of the pocket of his hoodie, along with Splenda packets and Dixie Crystals, and scattering them across the table next to the cup.

I blink. I know I manage that much because the vision of him disappears momentarily but when my eyelids are back in place, he’s still there. His thigh is touching mine, dark jeans to Christmas jammies, and he’s so big I have to scoot to the left and tuck my elbow against the armrest to keep from pressing all over his arm and shoulder, too.

“Aren’t you in my Econ class?” he asks. “I think you are. I know I’ve seen you. You sit up front. I thought maybe if I brought you coffee you’d share your notes or maybe go over the study guide with me? If Hux fails me, my coach is going to throw a fit.”

Blink.

Nope, definitely still there.

“So…coffee?” He’s so close I can smell him. And holy shit, he smells good. Musk and something woodsy, and Jesus, is that the green soap bar from the grocery?

I cough, trying to force myself to process the close quarters and form words at the same time. “Cream,” I manage. “Splenda.”

He dutifully dumps both into the cup and swirls the concoction with a little black stir stick. Something about that image imprints itself into my brain, his giant hands making the cup look like a dollhouse miniature.

I forget it in the next instant when he sticks the stirrer in his mouth and simultaneously hands me the cup. I’m thankful for the coffee. Remaining upright keeps the hot liquid in the cup and me from falling against the back of the loveseat in a dead faint.

“So notes? Studying?” His voice drops a little as he fiddles with the stick in his mouth, talking around it and sliding it against his cheek with his tongue. “Please?”

As it turns out, I would strip naked and run down the Magnificent Mile if this man would say that word to me in that tone again. I hand him my study guide and a highlighter.

“I don’t really know what the fuck I’m doing, but you’re welcome to anything I have.”

It’s not a huge smile. It’s more of a smirk that twists that slightly uneven face of his when I say it. In the back of my mind, I can hear Finn, ever a jackass, shouting “That’s what she said!” at top volume.

Is it possible to spontaneously combust? I’ll have to ask Paige. She’s pre-pharm. She’s knows all about chemistry stuff.  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Econ questions and concepts found online at David Nazarian College of Business and Economics, sample exams for Microeconomics. 
> 
> Feedback is always appreciated.


	3. Study Buddies

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Second update in two days. Damn you, Adam Driver.

“I sit in the back, but I always see you down front. Hux, uh, kind of likes to pick on you.”

“Hux is a dick.”

Ben Solo doesn’t fit in this loveseat. He’s given up on containing his giant frame in a way that doesn’t overtake me, and as a result his elbow is currently resting on my lap while we go over the study guide, quizzing one another and comparing answers. His are right. I really don’t know why he thought I would be any help. He’s apparently seen me stammer through wrong answers to Hux on more than one occasion. He sits in the back, shows up at the last minute and high tails it out when it’s over, which explains why I’ve never seen him.

“I’m not sure if he’s really that passionate about econ, or if he just likes making us feel stupid.”

“Definitely the latter.” Sneaking at him while he peers at the study guide, my fingers itch to push the errant lock of black hair out of his face. It slips down all the time. He really ought to braid it for games before he suits up. Oh. Now there’s a thought.

He looks up, almost catching me, but I school my face into an impassive, slightly interested mask in a hurry. “You can’t actually be in danger of failing. You really know this stuff, whereas I…”

“Who knows?” When he shrugs, his body rolls into mine. It’s a kind of grace, oddly enough. I’ve seen it on the ice before, the way small movements seem to spread through all of his limbs. “Nobody can tell with the way Hux grades. I haven’t figured out if he grades on a curve every time, or just when he feels like somebody will break it and screw everyone else.” He catches his bottom lip momentarily in his teeth, and between the closeness of him and the heat that’s starting to seep into my body from his, I have trouble focusing for a second. “So what do you like – I mean besides hockey?”

Oh, God. He knows. My face must be the color of my jersey because he knows. He has figured out that I’m sitting here trying to covertly sniff him and burn the pattern of hair on his forearms where he has one hoodie sleeve pushed up into my long-term memory.

“H-hockey?”

Solo reaches out one long finger and taps my shirt, right around my clavicles. “Blackhawks. Hockey? I thought maybe you were a fan of the game?”

Right. Because I look like a demented sports-obsessed Christmas elf at the moment.

“Or is it your boyfriend’s?”

I… “Pardon?”  
  


“The jersey?” He’s suddenly paying close attention to our study guides, marking things with my highlighter cap between his lips for all that is holy, not looking up at me. “Is it your boyfriend’s jersey?”

“I…No. I mean, yes. Yes, hockey fan. No, not my boyfriend’s jersey.” I sit up a bit, which knocks his knee into my thigh more firmly. “Not that it could be, because I don’t have one. A boyfriend. Not a jersey. Obviously, I have one of those. I don’t have a boyfriend.”

“Umhmm.” The highlighter hangs between his teeth, dividing his lower lip. He’s obscene. “Do you think marginal cost will even be on this test?”

I lean back again, sighing, but trying not to be loud about it. “Um, I hope not?” We go over page three for a while, giving each other definitions to choose among for concepts he knows much better than I do.

“I like cars, and I like to draw,” I say, my mind still on our awkward conversation. “I really miss how beautiful cars were pre-1970s. We have so much technology today and yet very few automotive manufacturers think about style in their designs. They add more and more tech, some of which is great, but our vehicles have become utilitarian instead of enjoyable.” My hands are in the air between us, which isn’t a large space anyway, tracing patterns without thinking too much about it. “I would love to build cars that make driving a pleasurable experience again, instead of just a way to get from point A to point B.”

He’s actually looking directly into my eyes, and the experience unnerves me. He has this look when he concentrates that makes you wonder if his next move will involve hot oil and handcuffs or a sharp knife and quick death.

“Rey?” Someone is whisper yelling from this side of the grad team rooms. “Where are you? Let’s go.”

Paige.

Ben automatically drops my gaze and sticks his face back into our study guides.   
  


“Over here,” I call, managing not to let my voice quaver. Please, Paige. Do not smirk. Do not laugh. Do not do that wide-eyed farm girl from Goshen look when you see us. _Please, please, please._

She rounds the corner, takes in the hulk folded into the loveseat next to me, and her perfectly-glossed at 1 a.m. mouth (Why? How?) actually drops open. It’s not a good look, even on Paige. Thankfully, Ben isn’t looking up so she’s able to compose herself before he notices.

“Oh,” she says. “Okay. Study buddies. How quaint. Listen, I’m ready. Get your crap, ok?”

“Yeah,” I say, swinging one leg off the coffee table and leaning forward to grab the coffee he made, which I don’t ever plan on ever trashing. “Okay. We were still studying, but that’s cool.”  
  


She arches a brow in my direction. “Well, I can uber but I don’t know if you want to call one if it gets much later. Weirdos, you know?”

“I can walk her.”

It’s the first thing he’s said since Paige found us.

“Huh?” Paige must be affected. That’s the second time she’s dropped her smooth, cool-girl act.

He looks up at me, dark eyes framed by slightly down swept black lashes. That hunk of hair is falling over his right brow again. It’s laying on the side of his too-long nose like the wing of a dark angel. “We can study a little longer, and then I can walk you. I mean, if you want?”  
  


“Yeah.” I nod, a little too quickly. “Yeah, let’s do that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Is anybody out there? Anybody?? *tap* Is this thing on??


	4. Big Ben

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wrote and posted this while a bit lit, so if there are errors, I'll fix them tomorrow.

His coat looks like a cross between a military duffel bag and an Olympic uniform. It, like him, is fucking huge. It also smells ah-mazing, which is more than I can probably say for my plaid throw, which he is dragging a bit from one of his large hands, while the other hand toys obscenely with the strap of his black backpack. 

“Do I look as ridiculous as I feel?” I hold one arm out toward him, stretching my fingertips to reach out the end of one of his sleeves.

He stops before we get to the crosswalk to inspect me. His mouth slants into a sideways grin and one eyebrow arches toward that magnificent black hair of his. He towers above me. “I wouldn’t say ridiculous.” He cocks his head to the left. “I would say...small. You  look small.” 

“Well,” I huff, pulling the edges of the coat together and wrapping it more tightly around me while trying not to drop my computer bag in the snow, “not everybody is so damned big, Ben Solo.” I stop. “Big Ben. That’s a good name for you, actually.” 

He laughs, but quietly, like he’s afraid someone might hear him. “Double XL.” 

“What?” 

His fingers comb through the locks above his eyes. “Something my dad always says. It’s a stupid country song. ‘I’m a double XL, baby.’” 

I’m not entirely sure the transmitters between my brain and my mouth are working. I find myself gaping for longer than is strictly necessary, until I notice that the snow has started to fall again, March be damned, because it’s Chicago, and of course it bloody has. “Right,” I say. “Jesus, it’s cold.” 

As we’re crossing the street, I notice that my throw is dragging the ground beside him in earnest. “Hey,” I say, plucking at it. “I know it’s not as nice as your double XL coat here but you could show some respect. That plaid has seen me through quite a few break ups and it’s my cat’s favorite place to sleep.” 

He blinks a second, before swirling it up around his shoulders, cape-style. “What do you think?” he asks, dark eyes and hair somehow glittering in the blur of snow falling beneath the amber tinge of street lamp light. “Do I look like a dark lord?”   


I gulp. “You look like a bloody demon.” 

“Is that a good thing or a bad thing?”

“Depends. Are you here to steal my virtue or damn me to hell?” 

It’s his turn to blink, and I notice with some  satisfaction , also bite at that plush bottom lip of his. I want to help him. 

His hand reaches out for mine as we start to walk again, and I can feel the warmth of him, his fingers in their black gloves engulfing mine in their fingerless purple cotton Wal-Mart specials. It is stupidly cold. So cold, even for my London blood, that I wonder if “The Windy City” moniker is really a way to try to make this place that feels like what hell might for a large portion of the populace, seem quaint instead of horrific. 

His fingers trace a pattern against my palm as we walk, his coat and scent warm against my breasts and floating in my nostrils. “I’m not on the make here,” he says, quietly. “I just keep seeing you, and I wanted to say hello before, but um.” He stops, and I glance up and up at him, expectant. “Well.” He stops again. “Well, it sounds stupid, but I can’t exactly just talk to whoever I want most of the time. I have to think about it and plan it, sort of.” 

“Because of who you are?”

He blinks, and for a moment, I think he is maybe looking at my mouth, but I can’t be sure. 

We start walking again, and I’m pretty sure he’s not going to answer me. We’re nearly past one of my favorite Gothic churches in the city when he finally speaks. “No,” and his voice is nearly imperceptible. “because of who people think I am.” 

He stands there a beat longer, my plaid throw practically a towel across his broad shoulders. “Where do you live?” His voice is deeper than it has been, and the sound of it does something to me, something which begins in my neck and ends in my core, for which I have not properly been prepared, even with the myriad fantasies that have crossed my mind since I first saw him in person at a frat party last November. 

I give him the address, my voice barely above the slight whispering of the wind around us. 

He nods, looking at the ground, rather than at me. “My place is a lot closer.” He nods with his chin to the left of us. “Two blocks that way. If I promise not to steal anything of yours, can we get out of this damned snow faster? I don’t mind cold but I hate being wet.” 

I like being wet. As a matter of fact, I’m pretty sure I am right now. 

My tongue clicks as I regard him. He can’t be a rapist. I would’ve heard. Nothing about our student athletes goes without wide discussion. He doesn’t date often. There was some girl his freshman year and no one serious since. He likes vodka drinks, girly almost, with milk or Kaluha or Tom Collins mix. He supposedly fucks like a God and pays for the Uber the next day. He doesn’t do messy stuff. He’s focused. Good grades. As dedicated in the classroom as on the ice. Business major, which makes him needing my notes for Econ pure bollocks. He’s played hockey since he was old enough to walk, making the Williams sisters and their love of tennis seem like child’s play. A Massachusetts native, he is widely expected to go pro as soon as he finishes his degree. Canada wants him, but the Blackhawks are courting hard already. 

“Okay,” I finally say, watching the way he isn’t looking at me, how his dark eyes are trained on the concrete next to his giant booted feet. “Lead the way, Big Ben.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'll try to update again tomorrow. Sorry it's been a while. Quarantine with kids and WFH is crazy. How are y'all?


	5. A Good Boy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey. The next chapter of this is already written so I promise I won't leave you hanging quite as long. I just need to sit on it a bit so I'm sure it's not trash.  
> If you need something dark and sexy to wash the fluff out of your ears after this, check out my latest story, "Make Me, Take Me."

He leads me into a nondescript dark building still holding my hand in his, but lets go when we pass the doorman’s alcove. An older man with grizzled hair and an aquiline nose looks up and says hello. “You’ve mail today, Mr. Ben,” he says, reaching into a closet behind him for a package. 

“Thanks, Mitaka,” Ben says, and I wonder briefly about the package and the building. Somehow, I pictured him in a frat house with a bunch of guys in other rooms – you know, easily in shouting distance in case I have completely read him wrong. 

Mitaka nods, giving me a quick smile as I follow after Ben in the direction of the elevators. 

I can’t help smiling at the way the hulking man in front of me steps into the elevator with my plaid still swirling around his broad shoulders. He holds the open-door button with one long finger as I step in beside him. I notice he hits 10 and not 25 or something obnoxious. 

As the lift whirs to life, I turn to him with a sideways grin. “So what’s in the box, Mr. Ben?” I tease. “Your monthly supply of hockey pucks?”

“Honestly? Probably another care package for my dog. My mom really misses him.” 

He’s full of surprises. “Did you kidnap me and your mother’s dog?”

His dark eyes seem to glow under the fluorescent lights in here, and the mirror walls around us give a striking and somewhat intimidating impression of me surrounded by many more Bens that even I could probably handle. He leans forward and down, his lips close to my ear.

“Rey.”

I can feel the warmth of his breath against the rapidly unthawing chill of my cheek. 

“Y-yes?”

“If I had kidnapped you, you would know for sure.” 

All the air leaves my lungs in a whoosh, and he straightens back up, one arm curled around the cardboard box. I can see the smirk fighting to break free at the corners of his sinful mouth. He’s good. Really good.

“Besides,” the elevator dings, interrupting him as he gestures with one hand and then follows me out, scrabbling for a key with his other hand. “If I had kidnapped you, I wouldn’t bring you here.” Coming up with nothing, he stops in the gray-tiled hall and reaches into his coat pocket to retrieve it. 

My sharp intake of breath brings the smirk back as he pulls out his key and motions me forward. “So jumpy. I’m at the end of the hall down there.” 

“I am not jumpy.” 

One raised eyebrow is as much of a comment as I’m going to get on that. He fiddles with his key in the lock for a moment as we stop outside his door. He stops when the lock clicks, his fist completely covering the knob. 

“I have to warn you,” he says. “My dog can be a bit...overwhelming. Best let me go in first.”

I’m already picturing a doberman as he steps into the apartment, flicking the light to the left of us as he drops the box and his keys onto a small table there. 

In a moment, there’s a scrabble of claws and a ball of something gray with ears that fleetingly remind me a rabbit barrels from a door at the end of the hallway and collides with Ben’s feet. He drops to his knees immediately, his hand more than spanning the little thing’s stomach as he rubs its belly. “Happy to see me, Stitch? Who’s a good boy? Hmm? Who’s a good boy?”   


The snow has dried, leaving the edges and ends of his hair crispy and a little frizzy. He’s crouched in my cloak, petting what really might be a bull-faced rabbit. If it weren’t so strange, I think might come. Are visual orgasms a thing? Because a big man and a tiny dog is just...yeah.

“Stitch? You named the rabbit dog Stitch?”

He looks up at me, and I have to wonder if this is some kind of test. “He’s a French bulldog. LIlo and Stitch? Don’t you watch Disney movies?”   


I drop to my knees as well, and the slobbery little thing actually seems to smile at me as I do. My fingers go immediately for the ears, so upright and yet floppy. “Eh, ‘fraid not. At least not that one. Did it play in England?”

Stitch immediately decides that anyone who rubs his ears is a friend, and burrows his wide, fat little head into my Christmas pyjamas. 

He sighs, standing up and wandering around to flick on more lights while I take over the spoiling of Stitch, the French bulldog with the funny name. 

His apartment, from what I can tell, isn’t terribly fancy. It’s painted a chic dark gray though, with very white trim, and all the furniture looks like something from Ikea’s modern set ups. Shades of white, gray, and black, with here and there a pop of red in a lamp or throw. The man owns throws, and I have to wonder if much of this also is a gift from his mother. I can never picture Big Ben buying throws. 

Stitch has thrown himself into my lap, and I’m cradling him like an overgrown baby as I rub his smooth stomach. HIs pink tongue lolls out of the widest mouth I’ve ever seen on a dog so small. I think I’ve made another new friend. For a moment, I imagine holding Ben this way, my fingers in his hair, but I stop that thought just in time to keep him from seeing the blush that’s on its way. 

He reenters the living room shrugging into an oversize hoodie, and I’m momentarily treated to a delicious sliver of his tight abs as he forces both arms up into it. He hands his phone down to me at the same time as Stitch springs up out of my lap, his tiny tail twitching spasmodically. “Here. I’ve got to take him out real quick. The password’s 741623. Google Lilo and Stitch.” 

“Would you rather I come with you?” I ask, trying not to think about him leaving me alone in his apartment with his phone password.

“No, there’s no reason for both of us to get wet and cold again.” He reaches out. One long black-gloved finger touches the tip of my nose. “Your nose is pink.” He smiles and it’s tentative, almost shy. “There’s a coffee machine, or tea if you’d rather. Or hot chocolate?”   


“Ooh, chocolate.” I might have died and gone to heaven. 

He ducks his head and his hair is in his eyes again. “Right. Shelf above the stove. I hope you like Swiss Miss.” I turn toward the kitchen, his phone in my hand, and when I turn back around, he and the dog have gone. I can hear his heavy boots and his voice through the door. “Watch it, Stitch. She's not for you.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this story hit more than 1,000 views this week. I am blown away. I so appreciate all of you who are reading. Drop me a line to tell me where you're from and what you're thinking. Also, if anyone knows how to do moodboards or even a little banner, I would be very grateful. I can do words, but not images, and I would love to have some of those pretty photo boards people seem to have for their stories. The world needs Adam Driver in hoodies and fluffy coats.


	6. Scout's Honor

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello again. Would you kick Ben Solo out of the bed for eating crackers? No? Me neither.  
> (That's a southernism, by the way.)  
> Find me on twitter @TGBMcCray or on Facebook @Tandy McCray.  
> Come and chat or ask me questions or trade Star Wars memes. It's better than wondering if life will ever be "normal" again, right?  
> I have two other Star Wars stories currently being written: Make Me, Take Me ( no fluff in sight there!) and One Summer. I'm also regularly updating a prewritten Twilight fic, Cullen's Roadhouse. Please to be checking stuff out.

Once I’ve got the coffee maker heating a pot of water for our cocoa, I sit down on the couch with the throw wrapped around my chilled legs and his phone in my hand. His lock screen is him sandwiched between a short older woman with cat eye glasses and a gruff looking man who would be tall if Ben weren’t standing next to him. He’s in his uniform in our college’s rink, decked out in full kit, and my heart flip flops at the sight of him, holding his helmet around his mother’s shoulder and smiling a wide, genuine smile for the photo. He has the most darling dimples. That grin somehow makes him seem boyish, younger and sweeter than he probably is. I make a mental note to memorize it if I ever get to see it in the flesh. 

His background screen is just an icy pond. I don’t look at the apps or his texts or anything else, though my fingers practically itch to do just that. I quickly pull up YouTube and type in the names he’d mentioned, determined not to betray his confidence in me. 

Clicking on the trailer, my mouth falls open. “Oh, my God,” I mutter. “Oh, my God.” The little blue monster thing really does look like his dog. Or Stitch looks like it. Or, something.

“Oh, my God, what?” He’s shaking the snow off his hair as he and Stitch come back inside. Suddenly, I’m stuck. His cheeks are flushed the whisper pink of the inside of a conch shell from the cold. Stitch is sitting beside his boots angelically, waiting while Ben reaches down to snap the lead off and hang it up. Is this real? Really real? My fingers find my thigh under the throw and squeeze the flesh there. Nope. I’m definitely awake. I’m awake, sitting in Ben Solo’s apartment, holding his phone, scratching his very odd dog’s chin who has taken a scrabbling leap and jumped up beside me on said couch. 

“Are you sure he’s not a space alien?”

I like Ben’s laugh. It’s not loud but deep and throaty, somehow as perfect as everything else about him seems to be. 

“That’s what I said when Mom brought him home.” 

He moves into the kitchen, and watching him, it strikes me that he seems to move with a grace not unsimilar to his movements on the ice. He doesn’t float, but unlike most tall men who seem terribly uncomfortable with their size and try to hide it, his works with him and for him. 

He picks up the hot cocoa box and starts making two mugs while he talks. “Our big mastiff, Chewie, had just died. Dad and I were going crazy without the sound of his toenails on the floor, you know? He grew up with me, that dog. I loved him so much. It felt like the world would never be the same. And one day Mom comes home with that guy,” he edges his chin toward Stitch, who I think may be surgically attached to me at this point. “and I couldn’t believe her. He looked like an alien. So I named him Stitch.” 

I stroke Stitch’s nose. “Couldn’t resist him, eh?”

He comes over with two steaming ceramic mugs. “Have you met him?”

Point made. 

He doesn’t turn on the tv, but he does ask Alexa to play some background music while we sip and chat. He asks me about how I ended up in Chicago. Miracle of miracles, I find myself telling him the truth. 

My grandmother, Maz, had always pestered me about going to America, and when she passed my junior year and left me her small nest egg I figured the best thing I could do to honor her was look at American schools.

“I visited Purdue, for their engineering programs, you know,” I say, “But I honestly couldn’t handle how remote it was. After living in London, Indiana seemed like the middle of nowhere.” 

“Why’d your Gran want you to come to America?” His eyes remind me of a hunter’s somehow, deep and focused, tracking the pulse in my throat and the register of my voice for signs of I don’t know what. 

I color a bit. I hate how I can feel it flushing up my neck. I stick my nose into the black mug, noticing a small chip out of the handle and inhaling the scent of store-bought powdered cocoa for something to do. “Oh, I don’t know. Grandma Maz always said she could see things, bits of the future, you know? She said my destiny was here.” 

“Uhm.” He takes a long drink. “She sounds like my mom. Do all older women think they know everything?”

“Hey,” I push his knee with one of my socked feet. “Don’t be hating. Young women tend to know a lot too.” 

He sets his mug down on the coffee table, looking at me with an intensity that curls my toes. “Oh? What am I thinking right now?” 

I give him a wry smile, willing my voice not to shake. Don’t say something stupid, Rey. “You’re thinking it’s a good thing I already have a cat, otherwise Stitch would totally be running away with me in the morning.” 

Stitch lets out a tiny popping fart from his perch on my feet. 

“Traitor,” he says in the dog’s direction. He stands. “We should sleep. Just let me get a pillow. I can take the couch.” 

I stand up too fast, mug still in hand and have to lean forward to keep what’s left from sloshing onto the dark hard wood. “Nonsense. I don’t want to pitch you out of your own bed.” 

He takes a step closer to me, his own socked feet dwarfing mine as I look down at them. His socks have gold toes. “You could sleep with me?”

I gulp. What would Paige say? “Are you propositioning me, Big Ben?”

Those eyes. They are the ink in a lonely Indiana sky where light pollution doesn’t cover the glowing winks of stars. I feel his voice in my heart, close to where my soul must be. “Again,” he says, a roguish grin showing me his slightly unevenly spaced top teeth. “You would know if I was.” He sweeps the palm of one massive hand toward the back hall where his bedroom must be. “I’m offering you a warm bed and a few hours rest. Nothing more. Scout’s honor.” 

Damn. Damn, damn, double damn. Apparently, chivalry isn’t dead. “Okay,” I say. “I’ll take that.” 

His scent is more concentrated in the mostly dark bedroom. I try to inhale without his noticing but he’s shuffling around, pulling one side of the covers down on his low bed and grabbing a pair of shorts out of a dresser drawer. “I’ll be right back.” I watch him go before sinking down on the side of the bed he’s just turned down, fisting my hands in the cool smoothness of his sheets. Should I take off my socks? My pants? The ends are a bit wet, probably from the slush. And to be honest I don’t sleep in clothes most of the time. I just like to wear  pyjama pants as house pants. 

He emerges a moment later, shirtless and clad in a pair of oversized black shorts, offering me a hand towel. “There’s a travel toothbrush under the sink if you want it.” 

I nod, playing it cool, and wander into the en suite with my stomach in knots. I try not to think about his pecs, his washboard abs, his criminally well-formed arms, or the happy trail of dark curls above the too-big shorts. 

When I emerge, having given up on modesty and carrying my pants, he’s sitting up on the other side of the bed. He watches me, seemingly unabashed, as I slide in next to him. “Is this okay?” he asks. I can feel the heat of him already, even in this king-sized bed. 

I nod, jerky, my head feeling as full of sod as a puppet in a child’s play. “Yeah. Totally fine.” 

He yawns, and despite my best effort to remain lady-like, I follow him before I can cover my gaping mouth with my hand. It’s probably two or three in the morning by now. 

He leans past me, switching off the light next to me and treating me to a close up of one of his forearms in the process. We both burrow down into the covers, a heavy duvet pushing us into the mattress. This one has to be a mom or even grandma gift because guys don’t even know how to tie duvet strings, do they? I mean, not straight ones. And Ben Solo is definitely straight. 

“Rey?” His voice seems deeper in the darkness but also ethereal. This could all be a dream. 

“Yeah?” I try not to think about how close he is to me. But I want to . I really want to. 

“Would you mind if I hold you?”

I’m pretty sure I forget to breathe for a moment. Instead, I nod, like a fool forgetting he can’t see me. “Um, sure,” I say, and then because I don’t want to be just another jock groupie, I try to clarify what’s allowed. “No funny business though.” 

“Scout’s honor.” 

“Right then. Brilliant.” 

He surprises me by sinking further down into the covers and leaning his head against me, one of his large hands latching onto my hip as we curl together. My hand instinctively reaches down to touch his hair, carding through the smooth strands slowly, like treading water in a very deep, dark pond. 

His breathing and mine begin to slow, and it is just...nice. It’s really nice.

It’s hard to turn my brain off, though.

A few moments later, something pops into my head and I speak before I think. 

“Where would you bring me?”

“Hmm?” There’s gravel in his voice, the kind of dark warmth that comes when a man is near to the edge of dreams. 

“If you had kidnapped me, where would you bring me?”

He reaches up, flinging one long arm across my abdomen and snuggling closer against my chest. The plush warmth of his mouth is separated from my breasts only by the filmy material of my favorite Blackhawks jersey. 

“Hmm. I’ll kidnap you sometime and show you.” 

I lay still for a few minutes, my fingers threading through his hair, wondering how studying for a class I’ve always hated ended with me in Big Ben Solo’s bedroom with him snuggling my tits and his dog keeping my feet warm. 

I wonder if he’ll be this lovely in the morning. I wonder if he’ll walk me home. I wonder if he’ll think better of this openness and become the distant and dark god he has always seemed on the ice. I wonder if Stitch likes cats?

“Ben?” When he doesn’t answer, I move my fingertips gently down his forehead and trace my pointer over the supple skin of one of his eyelids. 

He’s asleep. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you're enjoying this story, I would adore a kudo or a comment or any type of feedback, really. Authors run on tea/coffee, feedback, and kitten cuddles. It's scientifically proven.


	7. Compulsion

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This pandemic is a thief of joy and inspiration. I work from home. I go to the grocery. Lately, I deal with my kids, 3 out of 4 of whom have been pulled for contact tracing at least once. We are all alive, which I realize is a blessing. But depression is ugly and this is not helping. COVID I mean. It doesn't help. Anyway, have some smutty floof. I needed it. Maybe you do, too?

It’s the smell of coffee, closely followed by the deep rumble of a whisper that wakes me three or sixteen hours later. “Rey,” Paige calls from somewhere in the dark, because it is, in fact, still dark. “Rey, I have to go.”

“Uhm?”

I’m not even sure where I am or if I’m actually awake. Is that Ben Solo talking to me? I’ve got to be dreaming. There’s no coffee this early. Paige never takes a class before nine and none of our midterms are in the morning this week. 

“What time do you need to be up, Rey?” That voice that might be Ben is whispering again. It’s so lovely. My hand snakes downward in the warmth of my bed, smoothing my own stomach and swirling against one breast, wishing for his fingers, for something more than a dream.

My eyes might be made of plaster. I give up on them. “No, Paige,” I grumble, annoyed. “Leave me alone. Dreaming...about Ben.”

I think she actually laughs at me. But she sounds like of sick. 

“What time, Rey?”

I pull my pillow over my head. “Ten. Go ‘way. Please–He’s...big.” There’s nothing worth getting up for right now. I swear I can smell him, if I knew what he smelled like. It’s a warm woodsy smell, tempered with the crisp freshness of spring rain. 

She definitely laughs this time. And she is definitely sick, because it’s a deep, raspy laugh. I should make her some hot tea later. 

It’s the last coherent thought I have before I roll over, wrapped in the smell and warmth of the best dream ever. 

**

I’m going to kill my cat. Usually when he’s hungry, he just yowls. He’s an expressive cat, one of the mouthiest I’ve ever met really. For some strange reason, though, he picks today to start licking my toes to wake me. It’s simultaneously disgusting and endearing. I might not throw a pillow at him if he stops soon.

The annoying buzz of the alarm on my phone wakes me fully about the same time. I’m reaching over to the bedside table for it and desperately, blindly tapping for the stop button when the barking starts. It’s a loud, angry bark and it’s right next to my head, seemingly trying to eat my phone and the noise it’s making. 

I scream. 

I jump out of the bed and clear across the floor, slip on a floofy black rug, and slide into a rather expensive dresser, making the giant and also likely expensive tv on it wobble precariously. 

Stitch stops barking and sits watching me, giant doggy grin stretching from ear to ear. 

“Bloody Christ,” I say, talking to him the way I usually talk to Tribble. “You think that’s funny, don’t you? Buggering  sharting prick. You’re lucky you’re cute.” 

Unaffected, Stitch walks right up to me and slumps in my lap. I sort of slide down the front of the dresser, looking around and trying to center myself. Center myself. In Ben Solo’s bedroom. 

Not a dream then. Stranger than a dream. I wonder where he went? 

Stitch has no answers for me, unfortunately. I do know I have a midterm in two hours, so I should get the fuck out of here. Sighing, I push myself up with the palms of my hands and make my way back into the en suite. 

**

I’m standing in front of the giant ass mirror above the sink still in my  underwear, brushing my teeth again, when Big Ben himself surprises me by appearing in the door. I choke on his Advanced White toothpaste. 

“Oh, sorry,” he says, his eyes lingering on my legs and then the white cotton  cheekies I’d slept in. “Didn’t mean to startle you.”

I blink, toothpaste running down my chin. “Wulyushdeed.” I shake my head and pull back my hair to spit, in the most ladylike way I can, into his sink. “I’m just freshening up. I’ll be gone soon.” 

Leaning against the doorframe, his shoulders take up most of the available space, and I realize, with a start, that he’s drenched in sweat. His athletic trousers are sticking to him in odd ways, and his sweatshirt has sweat stains at the neck and arms. 

I shouldn’t ask, since it’s really none of my business but I can't help it. “Where you’d go, anyway?”   


He’s still staring at me. Wet blue-black strands of hair stick to his forehead. I can see the shell of one of those likely large ears peeking through the dampness.

“Hmm? Oh. To the rink.” 

“Before 9 a.m.?”

There’s a half smile, and I cock my head, trying to memorize the crooked teeth, the way that full bottom lip pulls inward. “Five-thirty. Every day.” 

I whistle. “That’s dedication.”

“Compulsion really. I can’t stay away.” 

His eyes are on my mouth now. Ben fucking Solo is standing across from me in his bathroom. He smells like the whisper clean of fresh ice and the musk of dank sweat and possibly also pine trees. I should totally go. Right now. 

“Right. Well. You probably want a shower.” 

I make to go around him, but he doesn’t move and I can’t force my way past the giant Redwood of his torso unless he decides to let me. 

“Hey, Rey...”

I cock an eyebrow. “Yeah?”

“Would you mind just a little bit of funny business?”

Would I mind? 

“Eh...what do you have in mind?”

He’s just so...large. He leans forward, his body totally blocking the door. “Could I just touch you a bit?”

Oh. No kisses then. Right.    


“Right. Yeah.” I’m nodding as he takes exactly one step, bringing himself very close to me. “Touching would be okay.” 

The next moment, his hand has reached forward and down, and he’s carefully, gently, tracing my lips with his pointer finger. His thumb comes up and smudges across my lower lip, the hardness of it very warm on my mouth. 

I moan, because as it turns out, I am a shameless jock groupie hussy and I don’t care. 

His other hand reaches out and grasps my hip. Engulfs would be a better word, I think. His other hand joins on the other side and before I can so much as squeak, he lifts me onto the loo counter. Leaning forward, hands still on my hips, gently massaging, he dips his nose into my hair. His lips are so close to my ear that I can feel the slight in and out push of his hot breath. “Still okay?” His words are throaty, pulled somewhere from deep inside the massive chest in front of me. 

I nod, rather vigorously, my head as full of fluff as Winnie-the- Pooh's . His thumbs dig into my hips where the lace begins to reach over the globes of my ass. He pulls his nose down under my ear, sliding it from there down my neck and back up to my ear in a circuit that is frying whatever intention I had to keep this odd visit funny-business free. 

“Do you know what it does to me seeing you here in that jersey and those sweet little panties?”

I gulp. “N-no.”

“Yes, you do. That’s why you took the jammies off, isn’t it?” His lips are now laving at my throat, licking softly at the place where my jaw meets my neck. “ So I could see that ass for real. Jesus, I wanted to flip you over and bury my face in  it last night. I’ve wanted to do that for so long, and now you’re here –” at this point his drops his head and sinks his teeth into my neck just so, hard enough to make my insides twitch but not hard enough to mark me. “And I have to behave or you’ll think I’m some sleezy frat boy out for pussy.” 

The way he says pussy does it, deep and through cleaned teeth. My legs fall wide apart, and I reach up for him, twining my hands around his neck and into his hair. It’s the only time in my life I’ve just gone for it. So I decide to really go, doubts be damned.

“Behaving is overrated, you know,” I say, placing my lips next to his ear and biting down just slightly on the lobe. His sweaty hair sticks to my cheek. “I’ve just decided this minute that behaving is bleeding overrated.” 

“Fuck.” The word comes out as a growl and in a move as fast and feral as the ones he makes on the rink, he lifts me up again and settles me against his waist. I wrap my legs quickly around him, afraid of falling, but he’s got me firmly, one hand on each cheek of my ass. “You’re going to fucking kill me, Rey.” 

I can feel him through the loose athletic trousers. I don’t think he’s wearing underwear. Or if he is, he’s so big that they’re pretty useless. I grind my center against him shamelessly. I don’t care. I don’t care. I don’t care. Just never let him stop. 

He swings me around and stalks toward the bed, forearms vice grips against my sides. I weight over nine stone but he handles me as though I am no heavier than his kit bag. 

He drops me onto the bed and I do squeak, all the air leaving my lungs as rips off his sweatshirt and leans forward to help me pull my jersey over my head. 

One huge hand  drifts immediately to my breasts, squeezing. HIs lips follow, plush perfection smoothing over them, drawing one and then the other into his hot, wet mouth. 

“Oh, fuccckkk.” It’s my turn to growl, and I can feel him smile against me, his tongue swiping over one nipple with determination. 

I might be pulling his lovely hair out at the roots. I can’t really be arsed about it. 

It’s at this rather inopportune moment that his phone rings. With both of his powerful hands he presses my tiny tits together, rubbing the sides against his face, which is buried in my chest. “Fuck ‘ em ,” he says, not answering.

“Yes.” I’m straight up moaning, twitching and squirming my legs, hoping to get enough friction to not combust before he gets there. “Quite right.” 

It beeps, going to voicemail. He’s nibbling at the soft skin under my breasts, then smoothing the bites with a swirl of his wide tongue. A few seconds later, his phone rings again. 

A deep breath in and out shakes his chest. HIs fingers are at the band of my underwear. I sigh, loudly. “You should, um. You should probably get that.” 

One finger  dips under the band, just an inch. The bloody phone keeps ringing. Slipping it out, he finds my breast again, and holds it as he reaches blindly for the phone in his pants. “What?” he barks. I’ve never heard him sound like that, except when he’s arguing with a referee or pissing off a lineman. 

Suddenly, he sits up straight, pulling completely away. He mops his flushed face with the flat of his palm. “No. No, I know that’s not respectful.” Pause. “No, I. ..will you just listen? I’m sorry. I was, um, distracted. Not your fault, Mom. My fault.”

**Author's Note:**

> Hey. I needed a floofy outlet to switch between when I'm working on One Summer. Also, I have some drabbles up if you're interested. Please talk to me. I need validation (and tea) to survive. This is inspired by a beautiful pic of Adam that someone posted on FB the other day (I'm sorry I don't remember who!) where he's lounging with a book in a hoodie. He looks very studious and cute. My brain went haywire from there. I would include the photo but I don't even know how to make links live on here yet, soooo...  
> Hi. And bye for now.


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